ACTING STATE ENTOMOLOGIST. 
not for the entire period of two years, but for a fair and reasonable 
time. Your President in bis reply, dated July 3d, 1867, declined 
the former alternative and accepted the latter, generously leaving 
the amount of labor to be done by me on account of the itfoOO 
entirely to my discretion. And here-the matter rested for the 
present; and I went ahead with those investigations, which I had 
commenced at the end of May and continued up to the receipt of 
President Baldwin’s last letter. 
It was my earnest wish to have attended the Meeting of your 
Society held at South Pass, Sept. 3—5, 1867 ; hut, as will be seen 
from the following report, several insects —and in particular a very 
delicate small moth preying on the plum, which was an entirely 
new discovery of mine, and which will be found figured and 
described in the Report as “the Plum Moth”—would persist in 
coming out at that very period; and if I had then left home, 
almost all my specimens of this moth would have been ruined for 
want of immediate attention, and the discovery thrown over to be 
completed in some subsequent year. I had also other investiga¬ 
tions in progress which required daily care ; and I ventured to 
flatter myself, that I could do the fruit-growers of Illinois more 
service by staying at home and minding my business, than by 
laying before them in person discoveries only half finished and 
theories based upon too slender a foundation of facts. 
A month later, when the entomological season was nearly closed, 
I attended the Fair of the State Agricultural Society; and on 
conversing there with many of our leading Agriculturists and 
Horticulturists, I found —much to my surprise—that it was the 
universal opinion among them, that if I went on, fairly and 
honestly and to the best of my ability discharging the duties of 
State Entomologist till the next Biennial Session of the Legisla¬ 
ture, the Senate would then undoubtedly confirm my appointment 
by the Governor; and I was strongly urged and advised to take 
this course by all these gentlemen. I may add that officers of t e 
State Agricultural Society proposed to me in private, to have t e 
same sum appropriated in my behalf on the part of their ociety, 
which your Society had already appropriated for a similar object 
This offer, however, I respectfully but thankfully declined; for 1 
had already made up my mind to go on and discharge the duties ot 
